<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>a tumble brings you higher by Padraigen</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28454562">a tumble brings you higher</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Padraigen/pseuds/Padraigen'>Padraigen</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Cuddling &amp; Snuggling, Gen, Hurt Steve Rogers, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Pre-Slash, Steve Rogers Feels, Steve Rogers Needs a Hug, Tony Stark Has A Heart</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-31</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 23:01:07</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,210</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28454562</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Padraigen/pseuds/Padraigen</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>For the prompt:<br/>Post-CW: Team cap is caught in a bad OP and Bucky/Sam ends up using the flip phone to call Tony, because Steve is gravely injured. Cue Tony flying in and helping to rescue/take care of him, since they can't take him to a hospital. Steve thinks he's hallucinating because Tony hates him now and would never come to help him like this, right? But Tony is super tender, tending to his wounds, giving him water, even warming up his body with cuddling.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Steve Rogers/Tony Stark</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>21</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>214</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Marvel Trumps Hate 2019</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. I.</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/nanasekei/gifts">nanasekei</a>.</li>



    </ul><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Written for Marvel Trumps Hate 2019. This work is for the lovely el who won my Stony fic offer. I am so sorry it has taken so long to get this out, but I hope you'll enjoy it &lt;3 With any luck, the rest of the fic will be out soon. :) Thank you!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>His stomach was on fire. Agony rippled through his body in torturous spurts, and it was almost all he could think about. His thoughts were muddled—<em>what happened?</em>—and his instincts were screaming at him to get up, get <em>out</em>, but his body—<em>painpainpain</em>—would not move.</p>
<p>There was a ringing in his ears that blocked out everything else—focus, Steve, <em>focus</em>—and it would drag him under if he let it. He wouldn’t, though. He <em>couldn’t</em>.</p>
<p>Something dislodged itself from his throat, and it reverberated inside his head—maybe a groan, maybe a cry, maybe a scream—and it didn’t bring relief like he hoped it would. An ache inside his skull throbbed. <em>What happened?</em></p>
<p>There was a shift—Steve couldn’t tell what gave, what <em>moved</em>—but now he <em>was </em>screaming, and the ringing in his ears was so loud he didn’t know if he made any noise.</p>
<p>—</p>
<p>It was supposed to be a simple op. In and out. Minimal confrontation.</p>
<p>He should’ve known better.</p>
<p>—</p>
<p><em>“</em>—<em>shit, what the fuck happened?”</em></p>
<p>
  <em>“Where’s Natasha?”</em>
</p>
<p><em>“We need to keep moving</em>—<em>”</em></p>
<p><em>“No, </em>no, <em>someone tell me what </em>the fuck <em>went wrong</em>—<em>”</em></p>
<p>
  <em>“We don’t have time for this, Barnes!”</em>
</p>
<p>Steve felt his head loll to the side, and his stomach still burned. His eyes opened, just to slits, but it was enough to see his feet dragging in the snow. He tried to move his legs, tried to put some weight on them, to carry himself, but all that resulted in was more pain—fierce and powerful and agonizing—and his eyes slipped shut once more.</p>
<p>—</p>
<p>
  <em>“You’re cheating. You must be cheating.”</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“I’m not cheating, Tony. It’s a game of chance.”</em>
</p>
<p><em>“Do you have all your ships on the board? Don’t think I don’t know that trick</em>—<em>”</em></p>
<p><em>“</em>Tony.<em> I told you I’m not cheating.”</em></p>
<p>
  <em>Steve couldn’t help but smile at the responding grumbles. He didn’t care whether he won or lost, more amused by Tony’s antics than anything. He was always such an animated competitor, and certainly more entertaining than the game itself, which was probably the only reason why Steve bothered to play. Not that he’d ever say so.</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“F8.”</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“Miss.”</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“Dammit.”</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“... H3.”</em>
</p>
<p><em>A pause. “How the fuck</em>—<em>”</em></p>
<p><em>Steve’s grin widened as Tony began an angry rant that Steve was sure he didn’t mean. Sometimes he thought Tony got so heated up for his benefit, like somehow he </em>knew <em>how much Steve enjoyed watching him go.</em></p>
<p><em>“After this I want a rematch</em>. <em>But I want to play a </em>real <em>game</em>— <em>like Monopoly. No, wait, I hate Monopoly</em>— <em>How about bingo?”</em></p>
<p>
  <em>Steve shook his head, but his smile held. “That’s just another game of chance, Tony.”</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“I don’t care. I’m gonna trounce you, just watch.”</em>
</p>
<p>—</p>
<p>He came to with a throbbing head and a half-genuine wish that someone would just remove his entire abdomen so he wouldn’t have to <em>feel </em>it anymore. <em>Fuck, it hurts, </em>he wanted to sob. But he couldn’t because even though he might not have been Captain America anymore, he was still the captain of this little ragtag group of fugitives and he’d be damned before he broke down in front of them.</p>
<p>He was fine. He <em>was.</em></p>
<p>“Hey, hey, hey,” came a feminine voice he was sure he’d recognize if only he could <em>think</em>. “Relax, soldier.”</p>
<p>Steve tried to open his eyes, ignoring the pain and the ringing in his ears—still there, if a little quieter—focusing only on getting his eyelids to move. After an infinite second, he managed to pry his eyes open and immediately wished he hadn’t bothered. Bright light seared his retinas, compounding the already unbearable pulsating in his head.</p>
<p>A sound so miserable he was almost embarrassed left his lips, coming out as a half-whimper, half-groan.</p>
<p>“Hey, Cap.” Someone grabbed hold of his right hand. “Took a hell of a tumble, there. Scared the shit out of Barnes.”</p>
<p>“Fuck off,” said a different voice, weak and sounding far away.</p>
<p>“All right. Maybe you scared me a little, too.”</p>
<p>His vision was blurred, but he thought he could make out a silhouette of a person hovering in front of him. Where was he? And <em>what had happened?</em></p>
<p>The last thing he could remember was the explosion. The blast had thrown him off a cliffside, sent him tumbling to a mound of snow below. His head felt like he’d knocked it into something <em>hard</em> and his stomach… He cut off that thought before his brain could latch back on to the burning pain in his gut. Debris from the explosion must’ve followed him off the edge.</p>
<p>“We’re gonna fix you up, Cap.” Sam. That was Sam’s voice. It must’ve been him doing all the hovering. “You’re gonna be just fine. Stay with us, buddy.”</p>
<p>Steve had only a moment to wonder at the real worry in Sam’s voice before he had to defy that last order and nod off into oblivion.</p>
<p>—</p>
<p>
  <em>“Shit, do you think he’s getting worse?”</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“... It’s been two days. Something’s not right.”</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“Of course something’s not fucking right, he’s got a hole in his gut the size of a damn baseball—”</em>
</p>
<p><em>“We need to </em>stay calm—<em>”</em></p>
<p>
  <em>“Stay calm?! How am I s’posed to stay calm when Steve might be dying and all we’re doing is sitting around arguing about it like a bunch of jackasses!”</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“... We should call him.”</em>
</p>
<p>A heavy silence rang out at those four words. Steve didn’t even have the wherewithal to understand what they meant, but fortunately nobody was asking him.</p>
<p>
  <em>“You’re kidding, right? After what he did?”</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“No, wait, maybe Nat has a point. We’ve got no supplies and no medical expertise, we’re sitting ducks out here, and—as much as it pains me to say it—you’re right. Sitting around arguing like we’ve been doing isn’t gonna help Steve.”</em>
</p>
<p>Steve wished his head would stop pounding for long enough for him to think and be able to offer his own input. He wanted to help, but at the moment he barely understood what was going on.</p>
<p>
  <em>“Just… wait. One more night, and if the serum doesn’t kick in, then we’ll call him.”</em>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. II.</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Steve was cruelly wrenched from the woolly distortion of his thoughts by his body seizing. For many seconds that felt like an eternal, relentless age, his brain completely blanked.</p><p>It was only when the blaring chime in his ears died down that he heard a commotion around and above him, frenzied voices yelling back and forth that he couldn’t quite keep up with.</p><p><em>“</em>—<em>need to hold him down!”</em></p><p>
  <em>“Grab him!”</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“Fuck, fuck, what do we do—”</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“Call Stark! Do it now!”</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“Where’s the damn phone?”</em>
</p><p>Something cold and damp was placed on his forehead, and the brief relief it brought could have brought Steve to tears at another time. As it was, it felt like all the blood in his veins was on fire, and the searing pain in his stomach was now impossible to ignore and didn’t allow him to think or even feel anything else.</p><p><em>“</em>—<em>c’mon Stark, pick up the fucking phone, dammit!”</em></p><p>
  <em>“Call again.”</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“Whaddya think I’m doing?”</em>
</p><p>“N-Nat—” Steve coughed, eyes squeezing shut at the pressure his heaving put on his abdomen.</p><p>“Shh, shh.” Someone ran their fingers through the long strands of his sweat-drenched hair. It could only do so much to soothe him, but nonetheless Steve tried his best to focus on it above anything else. “It’s okay, Steve. You’re going to be okay.”</p><p><em>“Stark</em>— Stark!<em> Listen to me. It’s Sam.”</em></p><p>For an instant all Steve heard was his own heavy breathing.</p><p><em>“We need your help, Tony… </em>Steve<em> needs your help.”</em></p><p>—</p><p>The next however many hours passed Steve by in a blur. He could only remember snatches of time and conversations, while the rest was a hazy period of endless pain.</p><p>
  <em>“What do we do now?”</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“We wait.”</em>
</p><p>
  <em>…</em>
</p><p><em>“We never should’ve</em>—<em>”</em></p><p>
  <em>“Just leave it, all right? What’s done is done.”</em>
</p><p>
  <em>…</em>
</p><p>From somewhere deep inside of him, Steve found the strength to ask, “Is… ev’ryone…?”</p><p>“Everyone else is fine, Steve.” Natasha’s soft voice was right next to his ear, her breath caressing the skin there. “Just focus on yourself, for once. Think you can do that for me?”</p><p>He tried to nod— didn’t want to worry her. But he couldn’t tell if he was successful on either count.</p><p>—</p><p>
  <em>“Where is he?”</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“On the bed.”</em>
</p><p>The hushed voices came from somewhere on Steve’s left. The second was familiar, but the first… well, the first was also somehow familiar, but it put his body on high alert. Enough so that he tried to wrench his eyes open to <em>see</em>.</p><p>
  <em>“Shit. What happened?”</em>
</p><p>It sounded like… but that was impossible.</p><p>Next came a sound like an object being scraped across the floor. Steve weakly turned his head in the direction of the noise. Most any type of movement he tried usually shot a spike of pain through his temples, and this time was no different. He winced.</p><p>
  <em>“Can he hear me?”</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“We think so.”</em>
</p><p>There was shuffling to his left, and then… “Hey, big guy. Heard you took a bit of a bad fall. FRIDAY?”</p><p>
  <em>“Scanning now, sir.”</em>
</p><p>With tremendous effort, Steve pried his eyes open. Even with his vision severely blurred, Steve recognized the brown eyes staring directly back at him.</p><p>“Tony?” the name left his lips on a weak breath, barely even a distinguishable word.</p><p>“That’s me.” And it really did sound like him.</p><p>Steve blinked, and blinked some more, but the indistinct form in front of him never changed. He could almost smile, because if his scrambled brain had to choose anyone to dream up, he was glad it was Tony.</p><p>He wished he had more time to speak to the illusion, but his eyelids were failing him and he was out again in the next second.</p><p>—</p><p>
  <em>“We got something he can bite down on?”</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“Here.”</em>
</p><p>A rough piece of cloth was gently nudged into his mouth. Steve bit down on it obediently, even though he wasn’t totally sure what it was there for.</p><p>“All right, Steve, just hold onto my hand.” Something hard and cool slipped into his fingers. “Feel free to squeeze as tight as you want. I’m gonna be honest— this next bit is going to suck. A lot.” The hand in his own briefly squeezed his fingers. “You ready?”</p><p>Steve hummed, as close to an approximation of an agreement as he was going to get.</p><p>“Three… two…”</p><p>Steve’s screams were muffled only barely by the cloth. Blinding pain seared his abdomen, as if someone actually was cutting it from his body, and his vision whited out. The metal in his fingers didn’t so much as creak as he bore down, and when darkness came, he welcomed it with open arms.</p><p>—</p><p>When he next gained consciousness, he could distinctly feel beads of sweat dotting his brow and above his upper lip, starkly contrasting the shivers that streaked through his limbs and down his spine.</p><p>“Hey, Cap, you with me?” Tony’s voice. Tony’s hand on the back of his neck.</p><p>His mind whispered, <em>not real</em>.</p><p>“C’mon, I need you to drink this. It’ll make you feel better.”</p><p>Something cold was pressed to the seam of his lips, which opened automatically. Drops of liquid dribbled past his lips, chilling and revitalizing him all at once. <em>Water.</em></p><p>Steve’s eyes blinked open, and he tried to hold his head up on his own.</p><p>“Careful. Small sips.”</p><p>After a moment the cup was taken away, and then a wet cloth was being settled over his brow. He grimaced, teeth grinding, unsure if the damp cold made him feel better or worse.</p><p>“Don’t be such a baby,” continued the voice his mind had decided was Tony’s. “It was barely a scratch. You’ve taken worse hits.”</p><p>Steve’s lips twitched. He marveled at how Tony could make him smile, even now.</p><p>—</p><p>Something warm and heavy was wrapped around his chest, and his back was pressed up against something—some<em>one</em>—soft and cozy. Even breaths skimmed over the skin on the back of his neck, soothing in their consistency.</p><p>Steve shifted beneath the arm holding him in place but stopped almost immediately when his stomach twinged uncomfortably.</p><p>“Don’t move,” someone said, rather unnecessarily. Steve had no intention of doing anything more to upset the wound on his stomach.</p><p>“T-Tony…?” he asked, quite without meaning to.</p><p>“That’s my name.”</p><p>“You’re… here?” <em>You’re with me?</em></p><p>“Yep.”</p><p>For a moment, Steve struggled to breathe. At that same moment, the arm over his chest adjusted its position, allowing air to pass more easily into his lungs.</p><p>“... Why?”</p><p>The silence that met this question stretched over an uncomfortably long minute; long enough for Steve to wonder if he was, in fact, talking to himself.</p><p>Finally, Tony took a breath and said, “Because you needed me.”</p><p>Steve thought about that. “Oh.”</p><p>“Yeah.”</p><p>He didn’t say, <em>I always need you, </em>but he thought it purposefully.</p><p>“Tony?”</p><p>Tony hummed.</p><p>“Stay?”</p><p>Maybe it was an unfair request, and when Tony didn’t immediately respond, Steve thought that he wouldn’t say anything at all. That he wouldn’t want to make a promise he couldn’t keep.</p><p>But then the arm around his chest tightened as Tony pulled him ever closer. “‘M not goin’ anywhere.”</p><p>—</p><p>
  <em>“So, what now?”</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“I’m gonna find a way to bring him home.”</em>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>thank you for reading! if you get a chance, please leave a comment to let me know what you thought! :)</p>
        </blockquote><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Come find me on <a href="https://padraigendragon.tumblr.com/">tumblr</a>!</p></blockquote></div></div>
</body>
</html>